West Virginia Blue
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Report: Health Care Costs Skyrocketing in W.Va.
Read the Report Here:
http://www.wvcag.org/issues/he... Charleston, W.Va. - The skyrocketing cost of health insurance is increasingly putting health care out of reach of working families and businesses in West Virginia according to a new report released today by West Virginia Citizen Action Group (WV-CAG). WV-CAG is part of Health Care for America Now (HCAN) - the nation's largest health care campaign.
Health insurance premiums for West Virginia working families have gone up 75 percent between 2000 and 2007. In dollars, that means the cost of family health coverage in W.Va. has increased from $6,844 to $11,970, and workers in W.Va. are not making enough money to keep up. From 2000 to 2007, health insurance premiums rose 4 times faster than wages. In addition:
· The full cost of employer-sponsored insurance in W.Va. equals 30 percent of the median family income. Without meaningful health reform, that number will grow to 53 percent in 2016.
· The full cost of employer-sponsored health insurance in W.Va. is projected to grow at an annual rate of 8.5 percent, compared to a 1.8 percent annual increase in income.
· About 140,000 working non-elderly adults in W.Va. do not have health insurance. That comprises 61 percent of the total non-elderly uninsured population.
· A recent report estimated that 62 percent of bankruptcies were directly related to medical bills; in W.Va. there were 5,133 non-business bankruptcies in 2008.
"This report shows the failure of market-based health coverage and the absolute need for a Public Health Insurance option as outlined in Senator Rockefeller's Consumer's Health Care Act he recently introduced in the Senate," commented Gary Zuckett, Executive Director of WV Citizen Action, "Consumers need a choice when the private for-profit market fails them."
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Sam Hickman, CEO of West Virginia's chapter of the National Association of Social Workers thinks the current status of health care puts a damper on the image of the U.S. as being an innovator in opportunity and achievement.
"Helplessness is seeing your health insurance costs rise four times faster than your wages. Hopelessness is having no health insurance and a sudden illness or chronic condition that drives your family into medical bankruptcy."
"The problem is vast. Not only do we have nearly a quarter of a million West Virginians without insurance, but many more with some kind of coverage find it increasingly unaffordable as premiums and co-pays skyrocket," said Rick Wilson, area director for the WV Economic Justice Project.
Health care coverage has become a major issue in labor contracts.
"As we see continuing escalation of health care cost and find our coverage reduced at the same time, the only solution is a public health care plan that will reduce cost and provide coverage to those Americans with pre-existing conditions now," stated Larry Matheney, Secretary-Treasurer of the WV-AFL-CIO.
In 2007, 249,384 people were uninsured in W.Va. According to a 2008 study by Families USA, one in four West Virginians die due to lack of health care coverage.
www.HealthCareforAmericaNow.org is a national coalition of more than 1,000 organizations pushing for quality, affordable health care for all regardless of pre-existing medical conditions. The organization is also pushing for the creation of a public health insurance option.
For more information, please contact Gary Zuckett at (304) 346-5891 or garyz@wvcag.org.
Since West Virginia is allowing its mountains to be destroyed, it is no longer possible for us to claim the nickname "The Mountain State." Nor is it possible to root for athletic teams called the "West Virginia Mountaineers." Therefore a contest is announced to select new nicknames for our state and our athletic teams.
A winning nickname will be selected in each of the following categories:
1. STATE NICKNAME: West Virginia, the ___________ State.
2. ATHLETIC TEAMS: The West Virginia ___________. (Or "Let's go, ___.")
The winner in each category will receive $100.00
Only submissions that include a West Virginia address will be accepted. Submissions should include name and address/phone number so if you win, prizes can be awarded. Your name and winning entry will be publicized. (Addresses will not be made public.)
Contest judges will be writers Denise Giardina, Arla Ralston, and the Rev. Jim Lewis.
Last week W.Va. Department of Environmental Protection (sic) Secretary Randy Huffman was on Capitol Hill boasting about his department's surface water runoff regulation approach.
This week the Obama administration U.S. Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement sent him back with homework. They want the W.Va. DEP to do a better job.
Who knows, with enough Federal pressure we may go from having a DEP with regulations that might help with surface water run-off issues to one that actually follows through and enforces surface water run-off regulations.
May 2009 unemployment figures announced. Here are the numbers for West Virginia:
LABOR FORCE DATA LABOR FORCE DATA
NOT SEASONALLY ADJUSTED NOT SEASONALLY ADJUSTED
Table 1. Civilian labor force and unemployment by state and metropolitan area
(Numbers in thousands)
Unemployed
Civilian labor force
State and area Number Percent of labor force
April May April May April May
2008 2009 2008 2009p 2008 2009 2008 2009p 2008 2009 2008 2009p
West Virginia........................... 810.1 793.0 813.2 796.0 33.6 62.8 33.9 67.7 4.1 7.9 4.2 8.5
Charleston............................ 140.7 137.2 140.6 137.5 5.0 9.4 5.0 10.3 3.6 6.9 3.6 7.5
Huntington-Ashland.................... 132.2 131.4 132.3 132.4 5.8 9.7 6.5 10.6 4.4 7.4 4.9 8.0
Morgantown............................ 63.7 62.2 64.6 62.5 1.8 3.1 1.9 3.4 2.8 4.9 2.9 5.4
Parkersburg-Marietta-Vienna........... 79.6 79.4 79.8 79.5 3.6 7.4 3.7 7.5 4.5 9.3 4.7 9.5
Wheeling.............................. 69.0 68.6 69.0 68.5 3.3 5.9 3.3 5.9 4.8 8.6 4.8 8.6
For all of West Virginia, 3,000 people joined the civilian labor force (May 2009 projected of 796,000 less April 2009 of 793,000) and the number unemployed rose 4,900 from 62,800 to 67,700.
Charleston (+ 0.6%), Huntington-Ashland (+ 0.6%) and Morgantown (+ 0.5%) all saw large single-month increases in unemployment--pacing the state overall gain of 0.6% to 8.5% unemployment.
The already hard-hit areas of Parkersburg-Marietta-Vienna (0.2%) and Wheeling (unchanged) saw relatively small changes in unemployment compared to the rest of the state.
Yesterday, a report "Commissioned by the Governor" was released outlining 14 actions the state should take to address West Virginia's exploding prison population. Months ago, I blogged about this issue and what seemed to be a very powerful push to build yet another prison in West Virginia.
The Rev. Dennis Sparks, Executive Director, WV Council of Churches:
"The tough on crime methodology of the last 20 years has failed," Sparks said. "We're locking up people and they're coming out as better criminals. We have to move into preventive and treatment mode."
Sparks isn't sold on the commission's recommendation for a new prison. He said he was in the minority when members discussed the issue.
"If we start building a new prison today, that'll be $200 or $300 million, not counting the costs to run it," Sparks said. "That's more money not used for innovative treatment programs."
Sparks contends a vast number of inmates are low-risk offenders while he acknowledges the need for dangerous criminals to remain locked up.
He also said he was concerned the public would pay more attention to the recommendation for a new prison rather than the other ideas.
I would agree with Rev. Sparks that people are more likely to pay attention to the new prison aspect as opposed to anything else in the report.
The Rev. Matthew Watts also makes a good point when talking about what was missing in the report:
Watts said he was disappointed that the report didn't include more measures to prevent juveniles from becoming caught up in the criminal justice system.
"I think we're failing to realize that all of these adult offenders were children, and [many] were adjudicated juvenile offenders," he said. "You can't fix the problem unless you fix the pipeline."
I'll second that. It seems as if the report itself may be a way to try and legitimize a bad idea (building a new prison.) There are a litany of reasons that building a new prison will have minimal if any impact in addressing overcrowding.
First of all, 200 million dollars spent on a building a new prison is 200 million that cannot be spent on crime prevention programs or community corrections programs or even drug treatment programs, all of which would significantly reduce the overcrowding problem.
Secondly, our overcrowding problems are now, not later. This prison will take four years to build. Who knows how badly the problem will have gotten by then. Those against prison construction as economic development had better gird themselves, because we officially have a fight on our hands.
In West Virginia, you just have to buy an ad to have this kind of access to most of our state's newspapers:
For $25,000 to $250,000, The Washington Post is offering lobbyists and association executives off-the-record, nonconfrontational access to "those powerful few" - Obama administration officials, members of Congress, and the paper's own reporters and editors.
The astonishing offer is detailed in a flier circulated Wednesday to a health care lobbyist, who provided it to a reporter because the lobbyist said he feels it's a conflict for the paper to charge for access to, as the flier says, its "health care reporting and editorial staff."
The offer - which essentially turns a news organization into a facilitator for private lobbyist-official encounters - is a new sign of the lengths to which news organizations will go to find revenue at a time when most newspapers are struggling for survival.
And it's a turn of the times that a lobbyist is scolding The Washington Post for its ethical practices.
At least WaPo is finally being honest that it shills to the corporate world. This kind of access was usually free to lobbyists on the Georgetown cocktail circuit. Now that WaPo is admitting they're media whores, the only issue seems to be haggling over the price.
But for those who have followed the editorial pages of many newspapers, there's been no doubt why so many in the so-called "liberal media" always take the side of the powerful against the people. The powerful pro-coal lobby buys a lot of full page ads so in too many publications, the views of the people harmed by the coal industry - the Charleston Gazette and a few smaller papers being notable exceptions - are not heard.
I wonder how much the pro-coal side spent to have that factually inaccurate, pro-PaTH editorial placed in The Post?
Update:
For the record, if you're a lobbyist and you want access to West Virginia Blue, you sign up an account and post. If you want one of our writers or "editors" to hear your point of view, shoot us an email. It's free. We don't charge anyone to have access to us or the site. And taking out an ad on the site won't guarantee you favorable writing as the national Chamber of Commerce found out last year.
Again, all it takes is losing an election for the Republican mouthpieces to embrace the nutjob fringe wholeheartedly.
And if these people don't speak for the majority of conservatives, then where are the more reasonable voices in the GOP (and FOX News Channel) to reject and speak out against this kind of message?
I'm proud to have worked on campaigns with members of the United Mine Workers of America. From the short conversations I've had with him and the longer speeches I've heard, I can safely say there's a whole lot more that UMWA President Cecil Roberts and I agree about that what we disagree about.
If you haven't heard Cecil Roberts lately, watch this video for a real treat.
Sadly No! slaps around Don Surber so we don't have to:
Poor Don Surber. Apparently he's locked himself in his shack, barricading the door with various auto parts he found lying around his living room. He's sitting in a corner clutching a .22 in one hand and three bottles of Tylenol in the other. "Obama will have to pry the Tylenol from my cold dead hands," Surber keeps muttering to himself while pointing his rifle at the front door. Surber is certain that the FBI, the CIA, the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, CNN, La Raza and The Poca, West Virginia Department of Park and Recreation are all amassed just outside his door, heavily-armed and waiting for the signal to burst through the door, guns ablaze, in order to take away his Tylenol.
Part of the reason why we keep returning to the deep well of the blog postings of this Pliny of Poca - other than to ridicule his personal appearance through the magic of Photoshop - is just that there are only a handful of wingnut bloggers who manage to maintain that perfect balance of laziness, stupidity and insanity that Surber does. In any given post, there are general only slightly fewer errors than there are vowels.
Facts are stupid and irrelevant to the likes of Surber - probably why he's banned our own CA_Berkeley and WV26003 from his comments. Can't have reality introducing on whatever fantasy Surber is freebasing.
But as TinTin at Sadly, No! points out, Surber apparently can't even bother to read the material he links to in his hilarious efforts to back up his delusional claims.
ACLU of WV summer intern, Matthew Bova, has been working hard the last few weeks to help lay the groundwork for what we hope will be a campaign to successfully address the issue of racial profiling by West Virginia Law Enforcement.
This report on West Virginia's weight problem ties in with the state's high poverty rate and high rate of unhappiness. (Unhappy people often eat to mask their feelings and to try to find comfort in food, often unhealthy food.)
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- A new national study calls West Virginia the third-fattest state in the country, dropping one place from last year.
But that decrease isn't because the Mountain State is slimming down so much as it is that Alabama, the nation's second-fattest state, has bulked up quicker.
The Trust for America's Health report says 31.1 percent of adults in West Virginia are obese, and almost 68 percent are either obese or overweight.
For the fifth year in a row, Mississippi is the fattest state. The study found that Colorado is the skinniest, but that about 19 percent of adults there are obese.
Maybe that hole that many West Virginians try to fill with poor food choices could be filled if we had a better future to offer them.
Please go to http://cotocrew.wordpress.com and read the article by Caitlin McNulty of VenezuelanAnalysis.com. The more articles I read like this, the more I realize how advanced countries are with single-payer systems and how the AMA and the Insurance Companies and the Pharmaceuticals Companies have been able to use MONEY to keep us pinned against the wall.
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